


I'm Not Lucky

by NairobiWonders



Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: F/M, Joanlock - Freeform, borderline smutty mature, physical relationships, relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-28 21:50:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17795381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NairobiWonders/pseuds/NairobiWonders
Summary: This ... uhm... take a look. Tell me if it makes no sense. You only need to know what tshirt Sherlock wore the day they met and that liars statistically don't use contractions when lying. I'll clean it up as I can. Thx for reading.





	I'm Not Lucky

With the impossible excluded, the conclusion to which he came, a conclusion that wore the vestments of improbability, must, by his own axiom, be correct. Sherlock sought proof.

He found her in the kitchen clearing the table. "Watson, have you seen my old yellow tshirt, the one with the green clover." His wrist rotated and two fingers traced a circle round and round on his shirt front to 'prompt' her memory. 

Joan stared blankly at him.

Undaunted by her lack of response, he continued, "You know, the one that proclaims, accurately I might add, 'I'm not lucky I am good.'" Sherlock cocked an eyebrow at her, threw back his shoulders, puffed out his chest and awaited her response. 

Joan took in his manner and gave him a rather dismissive glance before turning to set her cup on the counter, "I haven't." 

She purposefully used a contraction knowing he would be listening for the full 'have not' - the liar's tell. Hoping haptic slips hadn't already given her away, she attempted to change the subject. "Oh, by the way, we need more dish soap. Ms. Hudson mentioned that," she turned back to face him. His eyes were locked in on her "... that we need more ... dish ..." she stopped mid-sentence and decided offense would be the best defense, "Why are you staring at me like that!" Hands came to hips and with furrowed brow she glared as menacingly as she could manage at him.

He smirked and took in a self-congratulatory breath, although he actually would have preferred to have been proven wrong in this case. 

"Why, and believe me, I do not mean this in an accusatory manner, I'm just interested as to your motives, why did you take my shirt?" He tilted his head slightly and squinted. Joan could feel him registering her every tick, twitch and irregular breath.

"Never said I took your shirt," she stated defiantly. "And what a petty thing to accuse me of. You know, perhaps you misplaced it or mopped up a failed experiment with it and threw it in a corner. You can be rather careless in the throes of an experiment. Anyway, you never wear that shirt anymore." She was talking too much. She noted it and was sure he had as well. "What made you look for it?" 

"I have my reasons." He sounded defensive, even to himself.

Firm stances taken and jaws set, a staring contest ensued. The weight of guilt soon caused Joan to crack. "Oh, alright, fine. I have it. Are you happy? I have it. It's not like I stole it. I just borrowed it."

"Why?" He asked having been unable to come up with any sort of motive for her actions. 

Her shoulders slumped and she gave in. Joan moved to the table, picking up a dish, wiping a crumb, anything so as not look at him as she spoke. "I sleep in it sometimes, okay? It's comforting, I mean comfortable ... the day we met, you know. you wore ... and we, and I .... when I'm feeling ... uhh ..." She stopped talking and winced, looking absolutely miserable. "Sherlock, please don't make me say all this," she whispered, eyes cast to the floor. 

Emotion at the sight of her distress overtook him. "It's alright. I understand." He nodded, his eyes quickly shifted away from her in an attempt to push down his own feelings. "Same reason I was looking for it," he murmured and he walked away.

 

Street light filtering through the dirty windows of the library highlighted the edge of his recumbent form while the deep red shadows of the couch swallowed the remainder. Sherlock had lost the battle less than an hour or so ago, grudgingly succumbing to his body's need for rest. The creak of floorboards now roused him. He listened. Watson no doubt had pried herself from her bed in search of water, food or need for intellectual stimuli. He closed his eyes and re-settled himself against the cushion's velveteen softness. 

The sound of bare feet padding into the library and moving toward the couch on which he lay caught him off guard. With his head in shadows, and not sure of what else to do, he feigned sleep. Through barely open eyes and a haze of eyelashes, he saw her standing over him. She wore the earlier discussed tshirt. The sight of her in the garment reignited the series of questions and feelings within him that had taken most of the day to answer and quell. He went into what she once joked was his 'possum mode;' breath and heart rate control became his primary goal. 

 

Joan's shoulders dropped and relaxed. He was asleep. Now she did not need to recite the words she had rehearsed for hours in her room. Words to cover her embarrassment, to obfuscate and confuse, unless she saw an inkling of reciprocity, then a whole different set of words waited in the wings. Verbal expression of emotion had never been easy for her. No question existed as to love between them, he knew she loved him as he did her. But as of late that love, at least for her, had taken on a different shape, grown fuller, matured, and she was unsure what, if anything, to do. 

This morning's feeble attempt at explaining why she had his shirt had most likely been misunderstood by him - his motives in seeking the shirt could not have been the same as hers. Her fingers nervously twisted the hem of his shirt. Tired of the vacillation, the back and forth and games of what ifs her brain was putting her through, her body took action. Arms crossed and hands grasped the tshirt's bottom, pulling it up and over her head. Standing nearly naked before him, Joan bent and placed the tshirt across his chest. "Your turn," she whispered and quickly walked away and back upstairs. 

 

The struggle to keep immobile had been a titanic test to his ability to 'play dead.' Though truly, he was not sure he had convinced her. He waited until he heard her steps reach the second floor landing before moving. Fingertips sought, then slowly pulled at and caressed the still warm tshirt. Her scent lingered on the material; he brought it to his face, and inhaled her fragrance.

 

Her bedroom door was open. Wearing nothing but lace boy cut panties (the style he had accidentally noted she was favoring as of late) and a sheer white camisole made almost translucent in the blue city light, she stood at the near window staring out into the Brooklyn night. The sight of her took his breath away and he paused in the shadows to regain balance. 

Joan's eyes flitted towards the door. She had noted his presence; now there was no choice but to proceed. 

She turned her head as she heard him enter. Sherlock wore the yellow tshirt and the sweatpants he had been sleeping in. He stopped a few feet from her and pulled at the shirt's front. 

"Before I met you, I rarely formed emotional attachments to things. Angus I suppose being the possible exception." His eyes focused on some vague nothing beyond her as he sorted out what he needed to say. 

Wide and betraying his fears, his eyes moved back to her. "You can have it if you want," he pulled the shirt over his head and stood bare chested. "Or we can share it," a small wavering side smile betrayed his awkwardness. "Or we can admit what is really behind all this."

He took a step closer to her, tshirt in hand. Joan stood mute. Immobile. Not meeting his gaze. He observed the stillness of her manner and drew what he deemed to be the only logical conclusion. 

"I misunderstood." He whispered. "I thought you might be feeling the same ... the same pull that I was experiencing." He pressed his lips together and waited for her to contradict him or at a minimum acknowledge his statement. Joan could not. He cleared his throat and took a small step back. "Forgive me," and with a rather formal almost courtly bow of the head, Sherlock pivoted and moved towards the door in an attempt to spare both of them any further embarrassment. 

"Wait."

He stopped and stood with his back still towards her. "It's alright, Watson. No need to explain. I understand. I made a mistake. The data was laid out before me, I simply misinterpreted."

Needing him to stop, to stay, to understand, and not being able to articulate those needs, made her frantic. In a heartbeat she raced up to him, laid her hands against his back and then round to his front, her forehead and nose pressed hard between his shoulder blades, she whispered against his skin. "Sherlock, no." The shock of her touch, her voice, left him breathless, head swimming from the sensations. 

Joan pressed her lips onto his skin, her breath ragged as tears spilled from her eyes, rolled down her cheeks then onto his back. 

Like Orpheus at the gates of Hades, Sherlock yearned to turn around but fearing losing her forever, stood petrified - until he felt her tears. Uncertainty, shame, fear, all transformed into one - the need to comfort her.

He twisted and he spun in her arms. Face to face with each other, with nothing between them but unvarnished emotion, understanding was reached with no need for dialogue. 

With the back of his hand, he wiped the tear that glistened just above her jaw, and opening his hand moved across her face. Feather light strokes of his fingertips traced in wonderment the beauty of her brow, her nose, her lips.

Insecurity and fear left her; she found peace and solace in his gentle touches. Joan's eyes slowly closed as she basked in the intimacy of his caresses. She felt the warmth of his face drawing closer.

"May I kiss you?" The words brushed across her face and she nodded with barely opened eyes. Sherlock leaned in to cross the small distance between them. His lips lay on hers, alighting for just a few seconds lest they overstay their welcome. His heart drummed uncontrollably in his chest with the sweet pleasure of the moment and the yearning for more.

Joan opened her eyes to his; the barely controlled need she saw in him reflected her own desire. She sought his lips and brought him back to her. Bodies that had carefully been kept apart with the first kiss, now crushed into each other and all semblance of polite adherence to boundaries was cast aside. His fingers splayed and raked through her hair, holding onto the back of her head, bringing her closer as their kiss grew in passion. 

The feel of his chest, hirsute and muscled, against her barely covered breasts, the press and grind of hips ... she could barely breath but she would not let him go. She clung tighter to him: a hand round his neck, the other stroking at his back. 

The need for air eventually pulled their lips away from each other but they did not part. Heads nestled in each other's neck, they held on relaxing into each other. Sherlock's hand soothed at her back, finding its way beneath the camisole and eliciting a soft moan from her. The sound further excited him and set off a flurry of small kisses just below her ear. 

Once she regained a modicum of composure, Joan attempted to be sensible. "We should slow down maybe? Take it slow." Her tone sounded less than sure.

"Mmm, slow..." he murmured. Her hand moving across and darting beneath the waistband of his pants made him doubt her commitment to slowing down. But he asked, just in case, "Should we back away, take time to reconsider our actions and ..."

"No." She interrupted him. She had no intention of letting him go. "I meant just, you know, slow down, make sure we are on the same page."

"Hmm..." he moved his lips to her ear. "Ever had the alphabet traced on your body or parts of your body?" He nibbled at her earlobe. 

She tried to sound sensible, "The Roman alphabet ...?"

"What ever your preference. The Arabic alphabet has some lovely swirls and dots..." 

"Hmm. Interesting. And... and how do you trace the ..." she stopped mid sentence at the feel of the tip of his tongue on her neck tracking the strokes of a lower case "j" dot and all.

"Of course, addressing different parts of the body in this manner will heighten the pleasure of it. Would you consider that going slower?" His hand dropped lower on her back until he was cupping and squeezing her bottom.

"God, yes, definitely ... yes, slower." Joan grabbed at him, pulling him towards her bed until she tumbled onto it. She lay on her back and beckoned him to come. "Cyrillic ... can we start with the Cyrillic?"


End file.
